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1939
1938 1939 1940 Events * Hatch Act of 1939 enacted. * Frank Capra releases Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. * Kenji Mizoguchi releases Story of the Last Chrysanthemum. * Robert H. Heinlein publishes anti-clerical novella "If This Goes on--." * France holds its last public executions. * Italy declares sovereignty over Albania. * Eugenio Pacelli becomes Pope Pius XII. His brother Francesco pacelli was the Vatican negotiator for the 1929 Concordat and Laterans Pacts. * British White Paper advocates policy of limiting Jewish immigration into Palestine to 15,000 per year for 5 years and no further immigration after that point. * Paperback books are introduced; they sell for 25 cents each. * Federal Hourly Minimum Wage is raised to $0.30 an hour. Timeline January * January 5: Voder (Voice Operated Demonstrator) is first demonstrated at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. * January 12: IRA sends manifesto to the British government. * January 16: IRA bombing campaign in Britain begins with 7 explosions in London, Birmingham and Manchester. February * February 4-6: IRA bombs explode in Britain; 2 civilians hurt in an explosion in the London Underground. * February 6: Mike Farrell is born. * February 18: Jamil Mardam's government resigns in Syria. March * March 2: Pope Pius XII, a.k.a. Cardinal Pacelli succeeds Pope Pius XI as the 258th pope. April * April 3: President Roosevelt signs the Reorganization Act of 1939 inaugurating administrative reforms. May * May: Fascist Arrow Cross surges in Hungarian parliamentary elections, winning 25% of the vote. * May 5: Hungarian Parliament passes the anti-Semitic Second Jewish Law. * May 17: British government publishes White Paper articulating policy to limit Jewish immigration to British League of Nations Mandate Palestine. June * June 4: SS St. Louis carrying 907 Jewish refugees is denied permission to land in Florida after already having been turned away from Cuba. Most of the passengers are killed in German concentration camps after their return. July * July 24: British Parliament passes the Prevention of Violence Bill allowing registration of all Irish in Britain and their summary deportation. * July 26: IRA bombing at King's Cross Station kills one and wounds 15. This the 127th IRA bombing of the campaign. August * August 1939: Pres. Roosevelt reads 495 word letter from exile physicist Leo Szilard persuading him to begin the Manhattan Project. * August 25: IRA bombing in a Coventry shopping center kills 5 and wounds 50. * August 25: British Parliament ratifies Agreement of Mutual Assistance between the United Kingdom and Poland * August 25: Canadian Militia are mobilized in response to the deepening crisis in Europe. September * September 1: Germany invades Poland. The United Kingdom and France declare war on Germany to begin the Second World War in Europe. Canada mobilizes the Canadian Active Service Force. * September 1: Whittaker Chambers accuses Alger Hiss of being a member of the Communist Party in a letter to Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence Adolf Berle, Jr. * September 1: First Cannes Film Festival; the second doesn't happen until 1946. * September 2: Daily newspaper in Beuthen, Germany reports that Polish Army artillery fire killed 2 and wounded 35 in the town. * September 3: Britain enters Second World War. IRA ends its bombing campaign. * September 10: Canada declares war on Germany. * September 17: Polish President, Cabinet and Commander in Chief flea to Romania. * September 25: German Luftwaffe bombs Warsaw. November * November: 11,000 workers at the Hukumchand Jute Mill in Calcutta go on strike. Owners quickly agree to a 10 percent wage increase. * November 9: Unsuccessful assassination attempt against Adolf Hitler at the annual Beer Hall Putsch Celebration. December * December 6: Gen. Fulgencio Batista resigns his Army commission to run for President of Cuba as citizen Batista.